Clegg hires Brian Eno as youth adviser

Nick Clegg today marked his new leadership of the Liberal Democrat party by enlisting Brian Eno as an adviser on youth issues and to help him fix Britain's "broken politics".

Clegg announced the celebrity appointment less than a day after being anointed as the party's third leader in under two years.

The Lib Dem leader is still putting the final touches to his shadow cabinet, which is expected to be unveiled tomorrow.

The decision to court Eno, a record producer and university lecturer better known for his time as a member of the 70s band Roxy Music, is part of his mission to engage people "beyond Westminster" in politics.

Eno told the BBC Radio 4 World at One programme his work as a record producer meant he had credibility with young people.

Commenting on his decision to join the Lib Dem ranks, he said: "They have shown themselves to be an independent-minded party.

"I think they are the real opposition. I think they are the only opposition we have. The Lib Dems are the effective opposition and I hope that, the election after next, they will be the opposition and maybe the one after that they will be the government.

Eno joined the newly elected Lib Dem leader at a South London sixth form college earlier today, where Clegg used an address to students at Bacon's College, in Rotherhithe, to accuse the Tories and Labour of vilifying young people.

He promised a different attitude from his own party.

"For ages we have had this political rhetoric coming from the prime minister and a succession of home secretaries that seemed to vilify young people all the time and make [them] into a kind of problem.

"I remember thinking: How can you hope to govern with any sense of optimism if you are saying the people who have the future of the country in their hands are a problem?"

Aged just 40, the youthful leader said people of his generation and younger did not believe every issue had to be reduced to a sterile spat between politicians across the House of Commons.

Clegg said politicians spoke a language completely alien to young people. "[That] is one of the reasons the Liberal Democrats will, in the coming years, break the stifling grip of two-party politics for good and change the system. That is what we are about," he said.

At one point a student asked him what he might do if, "theoretically", he became prime minister. He responded, laughing: "Theoretically? You ain't seen nothing yet."